


In The Forests Of The Night

by Aloysia_Virgata



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-29
Updated: 2014-01-29
Packaged: 2018-01-10 10:49:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aloysia_Virgata/pseuds/Aloysia_Virgata
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bedelia and Hannibal, pre-series, shortly before her attack.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In The Forests Of The Night

**Author's Note:**

> So many thanks to[](http://bugsfic.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://bugsfic.livejournal.com/) **bugsfic** and the lovely Tracy for beta-ing.

DISCLAIMER: Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Proceed at your own risk. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. For recreational purposes only. Driver does not carry cash. And, as always, thank you for choosing Aloysia Airlines for your direct flight from canon to fanfic.

***

 _La plus belle des ruses du diable est de vous persuader qu'il n'existe pas_. – Charles Baudelaire

***

Night outside, early winter, and the stars are bright and hard.

Bedelia has engaged a driver for the evening, her Silver Ghost purring up to the curb like one of the larger cats. She sees faces she knows, the hollow cheeks and tight foreheads of her milieu. Many of the women have breasts younger than their grandchildren, décolleté gowns framing the craftsmanship of their surgeons. Bedelia has not felt the need for cosmetic procedures but is aware of the possibility. She has taken to prodding the crows’ feet in her pale face, ordering exotic moisturizers.

The driver – she cannot remember his name though, truly, she hasn’t tried - lets the heavy car idle as he gets out into the cold to open her door. Bedelia tucks the white fox around her shoulders, such a gorgeous plushy stole against her skin, and winces at the cold.

  
“Ma’am,” says the driver, his uniform ill-fitting, the cheap cotton gloves unpleasant to her fingertips as she rests them at his palm. He does not know the right way to hand her out from the car, but she tolerates his grip until she is as firmly planted on the ground as her shoes will allow. She will not call him again.

Bedelia smooths the hair at her temples, aware of herself, the driver forgotten. There are copper heaters in front of the house, the warm air incongruous so near the snow. Clusters of people smoke and gossip beside them, the ladies sleek as whippets and the men handsome in their tails. The air smells of cigars and cognac, sex and money. She avoids these events as much as her social standing will allow, so much talking with so little said. It has begun to exhaust her, engraved invitations making her hands ache with quiet anxiety. But it’s New Year’s Eve and things have a penultimate feel, drawing her out into the fine, clear air. She has chosen a navy gown, a halter neck in the front, bare to just below her waist in the back. Shantung has an appropriate weight for the season, and she remains as delighted as a debutante by the ruched train. It whispers behind her like a secret.

“Dr. du Maurier!” exclaims an emaciated woman with a Clara Bow bob. Her fingers are cluttered with rings when she clasps Bedelia’s forearm.

“Elspeth,” she says with a warmth that owes more to good breeding than pleasure. “Delightful to see you.”

Elspeth Kameda squeezes her arm once more before letting go. “You look exquisite, you must get out more so I can watch people try and seduce you, you gorgeous thing. But let’s talk inside, it’s freezing. Come, Richard’s playing the piano and you must see the dreadful furniture Vera’s bought.”

Up the massive steps, marble clicking beneath their thin heels. The house is a Châteauesque monstrosity, a wedding present to a very young wife. It looks like a nightmare you’d have after visiting Biltmore. Richard should have known better, really.

“…getting divorced, no surprise there,” Elspeth prattles as they enter through an overdone ogee arch molding. The pattern is repeated at the windows.

They shrug out of their wraps, whisked off by faceless figures in black. Bedelia’s hair swishes soft as the fox between her shoulder blades, sapphires cold in her ears. They move through the vestibule into the main hall, the floor an immense chessboard. She hears Cole Porter, played badly and sung worse, from a room ahead. She peers around a pillar and there’s Richard, drunk as a lord at the piano with an appreciative audience roaring at him.

“You dodged a bullet, darling,” Elspeth remarks.

Bedelia smiles at her, a thin smile that doesn’t extend to her eyes. “It would seem.”

A waiter presents her with a tray of Belon oysters. She takes one, the shell cupped in her palm, the scent of zinc and the sea rising up to her aquiline nose. She tips her head back to swallow it, tasting copper and earthy sweetness in the liquor. Indelicate eating, oysters, but she doesn’t mind. They make her think of cunnilingus, so cliché it’s not even embarrassing.

She dabs at her mouth with a cocktail napkin, then returns the spent shell and crumpled paper to the server.

Elspeth’s eyes widen, then a smile creeps up her face. Bedelia turns to see what has captured the woman’s attention.

“Excuse the liberty, Dr. du Maurier,” Hannibal says. “I saw you across the room. I thought I would bring you something to complement the Belon.” He holds out a glass of wine.

Bedelia inclines her head a fraction in gratitude as she accepts the glass. She always finds him striking in a tuxedo, admires the elegance of his white tie. He is one of her few pleasures on these evenings, though she does not consider him a friend. She is not certain that Hannibal has friends.

She is not certain that she does.

“Our most celebrated oenophile,” Elspeth coos, her voice rapturous. “What have you brought her, Hannibal?”

“Le Chêne St Etienne,” Hannibal says, in his good French. “The 2000.”

“Sancerre and oysters,” Bedelia murmurs, lost in the heady aroma of the wine. There are mangoes and peaches and grassy notes on her tongue when she takes a sip. “This is excellent, I haven’t had the 2000.”

“Sotheby’s has a rare wine auction coming up. There’s an ’85 Petrus that may interest you.”

She smiles. “If you’re bidding, Hannibal, there’s no hope of my winning.”

“I’ll have you over for a taste, then.”

Bedelia feels Hannibal’s eyes on her, feels Elspeth’s eyes on them both.

“Bedelia, darling, I’m going to very rudely abandon you. I hope you don’t take offense. Hannibal, it’s always a delight. Do amuse my friend, won’t you?” Elspeth’s sharp little face is bright. Calculating.

Hannibal drops a kiss on the bones of Eslpeth’s proffered hand before she leaves.

They watch her go, Bedelia savoring the wine, wishing for another oyster.

“You look very well this evening, Dr. du Maurier,” Hannibal says. “That minaudière is lovely.”

It’s an art deco clutch in the shape of a peacock, covered all in crystals. “It was my grandmother’s, thank you.” She finishes her wine, lets Hannibal relieve her of the glass.

He sets it on a small table. “There is a gallery in the east wing,” he remarks, “I hear there are several tasteful pieces despite Vera’s Damien Hirst sensibilities. Would you like to walk there?”

Bedelia wonders what he has in mind. She does not think he is interested in her sexually, though there is at times a refined flirtatiousness between them. Rachel DuBerry had recounted her evenings with Hannibal under the seal of therapy, and Bedelia found herself listening more than professionally appropriate. ( _Have you seen him cook, Bedelia? He fucks like he cooks._ )

“I would,” she says, and he guides her away from Richard’s raucous piano, from Elspeth and the others whose secrets she keeps.

The hard floor echoes their footsteps into gunshots, their shadows stretching around corners and up the walls. “I must confess that my motive in speaking to you is about more than wine and art,” Hannibal says as they enter the long gallery. “Not that I don’t enjoy your thoughts on both. But I am seeking your opinion on a patient who has been referred to me.”

There is a Jiutong canvas on the wall, teals and cobalt and melting golds that draw her eye. It makes her think of plesiosaurs, of water lilies, of Zeus raining down before Danae. “Who?”

Hannibal studies the engraving on a silver and gilt tankard. “Margot Verger. And possibly her brother, Mason, when he…returns.”

Bedelia is silent a beat too long. “Molson’s children.” She wonders what Hannibal knows, why he’s soliciting her opinion.

“Yes. It’s the boy, really, who gives me pause.”

“I see.”

Hannibal meets her gas flame eyes and holds the stare. “Is there any value to therapy, or is this going to be a PR campaign?”

Bedelia looks past him to a vase of white flowers. Double peonies with wedding gown ruffles; calla lilies, their slender throats like a lamentation of swans.

_She’d worn white silk printed with watercolor bumblebees, her striped hat heavy with drooping ostrich feathers. She’d been at the fence watching the horse race, Margot Verger standing on the rail in a dress the color of dandelions, a black fascinator in her sunbleached hair._

_“Look at my horse, Daddy, look at him run!” squealed Margot, pointing._

_Molson stood next to Bedelia, too close for manners. “She’s got five hunnert dollars on that horse, how’d you like that?” He elbowed her in the ribs, and Bedelia’s lip curled in contempt._

_Mason ambled up, black seersucker blazer, a yellow gingham shirt. His white pants had grass stains at the knee. “I hope your fucking horse breaks a leg,” he remarked in a conversational tone, and punched Margot in the ribs. “Then they’ll shoot it and I’ll buy the corpse to feed to the dogs.”_

_Margot began to cry._

_Bedelia remained silent, watchful. Wary._

_“Don’t say that shit to your sister,” Molson snapped, cuffing Mason in the head. But he chuckled then. “Boys will be boys, won’t they?”_

_“There’s such a range with children,” she said, her eyes on Margot._

_The girl was rubbing her side and looking sulky. Molson handed her his wallet. “Go bet on another pony, princess.”_

_Margot accepted it, her coltish legs wobbling on thin heels as she strode off to make her wagers._

_Mason inched closer to Bedelia, smelling of sweat and dirt and anger. His hand was at his crotch, stroking an erection through the cotton twill. Molson watched, half amused. “Jesus, son.”_

_“I heard you’re a shrink,” Mason said, his voice raw. “Maybe we could play doctor sometime.”_

_Bedelia considered them both. She knew enough of the Vergers not to make threats and decided to bide her time. “I’ll see that your daughter makes it safely,” she said, and walked away._

“I don’t know,” she replies to Hannibal. “Margot seems a normal young woman and I’ve never heard anything disturbing about her personally.  
She could certainly benefit from support and counseling. But Mason is…Mason. And the father is no help, obviously.”

Hannibal nods, thoughtful. “It’s a fascinating case for nature versus nurture, if nothing else.”

Bedelia’s laugh is hard. “My god, Hannibal. What won’t you do to publish?” He is a formidable colleague; she must stop letting herself forget that.

“I didn’t mean to be dismissive. Their behavior does make me angry.”

“I can’t imagine you angry.” ( _He never loses control, Bedelia, I’ve never seen anything like it, he had me screaming against the sheets and just smiled._ )

“Everyone gets angry. It’s how we control it that matters.” His voice is low and hypnotic, a snake charmer’s voice. “That’s the essence of our profession, is it not?” He steps closer, and she finds that he is very tall.

She tips her chin up, trying to read his unreadable face. “How do you manage your rage?”

He looks down at her, his eyes such a strange and changeable color. They seem almost burgundy in the deep shadows. “I break it down,” he replies softly. “And I swallow it.”

“You turn it inwards? That’s not healthy, Dr. Lecter.”

“I transmute it into something that sustains me.” He smiles, and it is frightening.

She wants to cut him open like her med school cadaver, pin down the dark thing that burns in him, that peers out at her from behind his eyes. She hears the blood in her ears, feels the hot drum of her heart. “And what would that be? You’re my patient, Hannibal.”

“Perhaps I shall tell you one day, then. In your office.” Hannibal glances at his watch. “They’ll be serving dinner soon.”

She makes a mental note to hold him to this. “Thank you for suggesting the walk. These evenings can be…a bit much.”

“An asocial socialite.” He takes her arm, and his hands are a surgeon’s hands. “Did I make you uncomfortable? Speaking of the Vergers, I mean.”

“No,” she says, unable to decide whether she is lying. The golden notes of a harp drift over them as they return to the front hall, Prelude and Fugue in F minor from The Well-Tempered Clavier. Hannibal’s fingers are tapping out the notes at the base of her spine. Waiters are beginning to usher the guests to the dining room. Elspeth catches her eye, gives her a large, showy wink. Bedelia looks away in weary distaste.

“She’s disappointed in our early return,” Hannibal notes. “She loves to play matchmaker.”

“It’s how I met Richard. Hannibal, are you going to give the Vergers psychotropic drugs as part of their therapy?”

He chuckles. “Wouldn’t it be best for you not to know the answer to that question, Dr. du Maurier? The secret of life is to appreciate the pleasure of being terribly, terribly deceived.”

Bedelia tosses her hair, resigned. “Tread lightly, Hannibal. Should anything go awry, they have very deep pockets.”

“I appreciate your concern. But I believe my methods may do the Vergers some good.” He gives her the same smile he did earlier, the one that tickles her sympathetic nervous system, makes gooseflesh rise in the warm room.

His hand is still at her waist, a decorous gesture. The music bleeds into the jarring babble of voices, the sloshing of wine and the clink of crystal. She feels dizzy as the anteroom fills, disconnected from herself among so many people.

Her head falls forward, her mouth is dry. She and Hannibal are reflected dimly in the black square on the floor. Her vision blurs; the square is a portal to somewhere very dark, she could bend over and touch-

“Bedelia? Do you need to sit down?”

Breathe, breathe, chin up. “I’m fine, thank you.”

“Perhaps you need to eat.” His voice is rough at her ear, she smells his almond soap, skin-warmed merino and cotton.

“I’m considering retirement, Hannibal.” It’s true once she says it, a relief to let the thought out of her head. There are distinct advantages to being wealthy, and the ability to withdraw into an ivory tower is one of them.

His fingers press a little harder above the cauda equina as he picks out the melody from the chaos, as though he can draw the music from her. “That would be a shame. Perhaps a sabbatical could give you some clarity.”

“That’s a thought.” She takes a glass of something plum-colored from a passing tray. A disappointing Malbec; she abandons it on an apothecary chest.

“It would be a loss to the profession,” Hannibal says, escorting her forward as the dining room doors are opened.

The mirror shows a striking couple in the candlelight, strong features, impeccable hair. The woman is slight, her carriage a trifle too imperious.  
The man is tall, his expression a trifle too blank. Others watch them, making assumptions. Intimidated by their severity, perhaps, but she is past caring about these people and their lives and problems.

She realizes then that she is not afraid of Hannibal at all. Only of the thing within her that understands him.

***


End file.
